


burning with purpose

by theelusiveflamingo



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Community: got_exchange, Gen, M/M, R'hllor Problems, Red Rahloo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-18
Updated: 2013-12-18
Packaged: 2018-01-05 01:50:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1088180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theelusiveflamingo/pseuds/theelusiveflamingo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Beric gives Thoros the one thing he's never had - a purpose.</p>
            </blockquote>





	burning with purpose

**Author's Note:**

> Written for outboxed for Round 8 of got_exchange on livejournal!

As the youngest of eight his mother barely noticed him.  When she did, it was never with love, or really any acknowledgement that he was her own flesh and blood.  “Make yourself useful, Thoros,” she’d say.  He was four, always hungry with grimy hands, and it seemed as though his only purpose in life was to see how many lace workshops he could sneak into without getting caught.  “How, Mama?” he’d say.  Her response was never more than a smack on the ear and a whack on the arse.

When they left him on the Red Priests’ doorstep, he didn’t much care.  He could smell the fires burning for R’hllor from streets away, and from behind the temple’s big door the he could hear a chanting that buzzed like insects on the sweetest summer nights.  Inside, R’hllor was waiting for him.  The red priests would say, _Make yourself useful, Thoros.  Here is how_.

Thoros turned his back on his parents’ solemn faces and knocked at the door.

*

All the firewine in Essos could not have made the trip more bearable, Thoros thought as he clutched the rail of the ship that was being tossed about the Narrow Sea.  He’d hold the rail with both hands, but one was already holding fast to one measly flagon of the Myrish drink churning in his stomach.  He had heard in Westeros some worshiped a Storm God, and despite the red robes he wore, he suddenly believed this Storm God was a true god.  Thoros imagined him laughing like the howling winds with his grey teeth showing, sea-salt spittle flying from his mouth and anointing Thoros’s cheeks, as he threw the boat from one wet palm to another.  _I am a true god of Westeros,_ he would roar.  _You red demons have no place here!_

Thoros was afraid.

 _R’hllor protect us,_ he thought, so dizzy from the motion of his boat and his belly he could hardly think the words.  _R’hllor protect us.  This bloody storm is dark and full of terrors!_

But storm extinguished flame, he thought as he leaned over the edge and let the warm wine come back up his throat.  He heard something shatter and realized he’d dropped his last remaining flagon of his favorite drink from home.  A red priest had no business drinking, anyway, but Thoros mourned it.  He mourned it all.

_Who will I be in Westeros?  How will I convert this king when this is what his kingdom sends to greet me?_

*

When it came to matters of faith, Mad Aerys was about as unmovable as his yellowing fingernails were brittle.

“Not even three centuries ago, the Targaryens left the Valyrian gods behind,” he would bleat, his beard catching on his nails as he stroked it.  “And you mean to force some other mummer’s farce upon us?”

“I beg you take my words to heart.  I know you are fond of fire, Your Grace,” Thoros found himself saying one day.

Aerys’s face turned even paler than it normally was but for his cheeks, which burned a _fire and blood_ red.  “The dragon is not mocked,” he stammered.  “Get him out of here.”  The Kingsguard snapped to attention.  “Out, out!” he was crying, even as two white cloaks gripped Thoros’s arms.

Thoros found that he couldn’t stomach the thought of fire anymore, not even the fires of his own faith.  If R’hllor was the Lord of Light, surely he could find a place in any fire he chose.  Surely he could protect those who came too close to the flames.

But there were no gods in the burned skin on Rhaella’s arm that no one was supposed to see.  And if there had been a god in the flames that charred Lord Rickard Stark’s bones, Thoros thought this god deserved nothing but scorn.

The red of his robes mocked him more and more with each fire Aerys lit.

*

“You’re the finest priest I ever saw,” Robert Baratheon said to Thoros as he slipped off his red robes in preparation for another evening with the most unholy delights King’s Landing had to offer.

“Am I, now?” Thoros replied as they walked toward the stables. 

“You can fight, you’re remarkable in a tourney, and you can wine and wench with the best of them.  Besides, you’re a real wit when you’re in your cups.”

“That’s not hard compared to you,” Thoros said.  “You’re hardly kingly in your cups.  The things you say you’ve done with some of those whores—”

“Ah, fuck being kingly,” Robert cackled.  “Better to be a little unkingly than a little unholy, eh, Thoros?”

Robert told it true.  After a sword-shaped hole was cut through Aerys’s heart, Thoros’s mission in Westeros came to a drastic end.  His new purpose here was yet unknown, and still Thoros remained, spending less and less time in the Light of the Lord.  The meaningless chatter of pleasure-houses and winesinks called out to him, and the growing bulk of his belly brought him unexpected warmth on King’s Landing’s colder nights.  Yet he woke up every morning feeling like a husk, like a burnt-out palace.

“Perhaps if you find a wife you’ll settle down,” Robert said.  “Leave that Red Rahloo and become an honest man.”

“Ah, yes,” Thoros said.  “ _You_ settled down once you were wifed, didn’t you?  A fine example you’ve set.”

Robert roared with laughter so deep Thoros could see tears in his eyes.  “ _Settled_ , was it?  The day I lost my Lyanna was the last day I was ever _settled_.”

Even this drunk of a king had something he lived for, Thoros thought, though this something was nothing but a ghost.  

*

Thoros had been seeing fire all his life.  The fires in the red temple of his childhood.  The wicked pyres of the Mad King.  The flames behind the face of King Robert’s cold queen.

Nothing could ever have prepared him for the fire in Beric Dondarrion’s hair.  It was gold when the lad was still, and red when he charged forward on his mount.  When Thoros unhorsed him and he fell into the mud, Thoros felt terrible regret.  He was a Red Priest, for R’hllor’s sake.  He ought to have more respect for the fiery ones than that. 

“Thoros of Myr,” he said to the lad afterward, extending his hand.  “In the service of the Lord of Light.  And you are?”

“Beric Dondarrion,” said he with the head of flame.  “I didn’t know red priests could ride like that.  I thought you just spoke to fires and that sort of thing.”

“I’ve been here many years,” Thoros said, feeling strangely giddy in his gut. Perhaps it was because he’d just won.  “The place is a terrible influence.  Do you like wine?  I’d be happy to instruct you in matters of the Heart of Fire.”

“Certainly,” said Beric.  “Who doesn’t like wine?”  He patted himself down.  “But I’m afraid I might not have the coin.  I seem to have just lost a tourney.”

“That’s quite fortunate, that is,” Thoros said.  Beric’s hair was blowing in a warm breeze, now, and the way it moved was—Thoros blinked his eyes.  “I seem to have just won.  Would you join me for some Arbor gold?”

“I prefer red,” Beric replied.  “Funny, I would have thought you did, too.”

 _Maybe someday I will again,_ Thoros thought.

*

Thoros opened his mouth to let the fire in.  He had not performed the Last Kiss in years, since he was still young in Myr.  Instead of breathing in, he let out a howl as loud as the wail of the winds that had welcomed him to Westeros all those years ago.  The charming lad, his beautiful hair, his body broken by the Mountain, that monster.  He was gone now.

Nothing good ever came from fire.  Nothing good ever came from living.  And nothing, Thoros thought, _nothing_ good ever came from him caring and trying and—

The priests had trained him in the ways of making the heat float in his mouth while keeping himself free from harm.  He slid his fingers over Beric’s lips, urging them apart, and leaned his own mouth close.  How he would have liked to kiss those lips in life!  The thought caught him unawares and he almost swallowed the heat.

But it is true, it’s true, every word of it.  In the pleasure-houses of King’s Landing he had heard talk of men who liked to pleasure other men.  He’d seen them, too.  But never had any man he’d seen looked as beautiful as a woman, until Beric came along.  Sweet, strong, clever Beric of the hair of flame.

He pressed his lips to Beric’s and breathed.

Beric coughed.  He coughed again.  His body convulsed so hard against Thoros’s Thoros was afraid he’d crack a rib.  He leapt up, nearly pissing himself.  The flames had never shown him _this._

“What happened?”  Beric’s voice was a terrible rasp, and his face somehow looked gaunter once his eyes flickered open.  “What happened?”

“I—I can’t quite say—”

“Was I asleep?”  Beric struggled to sit up, but couldn’t manage it.  He rolled onto his side.  “Thoros, I can’t remember, how long have I been—”

Thoros dropped to his knees again and cradled Beric’s face in his hand. “You were dead,” he said.  “Clegane killed you.  He ambushed us.  I was performing the last rites…”

He kissed Beric on the lips before he could stop himself.  Beric’s mouth was dry and it was warm, as warm as the fires of R’hllor.  Dimly, Thoros felt Beric’s hand stroking at the prickle of hair on his scalp.

Beric pulled away, his eyes wild.  “I was dead,” he said.  “And you…brought me _back?_ ”

“The Lord of Light brought you back,” Thoros breathed.  “I was just his vessel.  He saved you.”

“Well then we mustn’t just cast that aside,” Beric said.  “You are powerful, Thoros.  Westeros will need you.  You should leave me here.  I feel…not quite right.”

“Westeros will need _us_ ,” Thoros said, realizing.  “R’hllor wouldn’t have saved you if there weren’t a reason for it.”

Beric sat up.  He did not look quite the same, Thoros thought, but his eyes gleamed with life, and his hair was red, so red.

“You saved me,” he said.  “First you unhorse me, then you save my life.  We’re even now, aren’t we?”

“I’ve kissed you twice now,” Thoros said.  “Kiss _me_ , then we’ll be even.”

 

If _this_ was what his whole life was meant for, Thoros thought as Beric gave him a crooked smile and leaned close, then every meaningless year had been worth it.

 

 


End file.
